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Great paper Xmadness, wanted to suggest something about it though if you push it out into a formal tutorial. You started to hint around at what I am about to say but then moved on into other things. Some stuff that would be nice to see in the article are a couple of other things that can make or break chips/chipsets (and is a large part of why AMD can hang in there with lower processor speeds). You have other variables in there besides how many things can be done with one cycle of the clock (although they are somewhat tied to a cycle of the clock). The biggest bottleneck on a PC right now is not the processor, it is the speed of the memory and the bus. Unless you have programs that are specifically dedicated to calculations that take advantage of the processors onchip memory and cache, the fastest processor in the world will still have to sit and wait for writes/reads/scans of memory and will still have to do this by accessing it across a bus (usually of the same speed as the memory). This also leads to another thing that can make or break a processor and that is its onboard memory/cache. The bigger and more efficient it is, the less often it will have to slow down by going out and accessing main memory. Intel released a version of the celeron with a very tiny L2 cache and it wound up being a dog on performance because it constantly had to slow down to go out and access main memory. You did mention this roughly by adding there are other things in the picture like memory, graphics gard, etc, but it would be nice to see a brief explanation of why that is so and to have it tied together.

Also, although it has been a very long time since my VLSI classes and I don't remember the exact formula, the single biggest factor in the power consumption of an integrated circuit is that frequency at which it operates. The equation is something like P = nf^2, where P is power, n is some other part I forget, and f is frequency. So as you increase frequency, you increase power consumption by the square of frequency (as frequency becomes very high, n becomes roughly irrelevant). And of course, as you increase power consumption you increase heat. There are some neat tricks you can do with integrated circuits like changing the interconnects, lowering the voltage (effects power, many circuits are moving from 5V to 3.3V, if they haven't already, but you have problems with interrpeting digital 1's/0's cause the 3.3V pulse is more effected by various types of noise), etc that can lower the power consumption, but it is still as far as I know the overriding problem in integrated circuit design. And on a final note, many manufacturers are now looking into materials alternative to pure silicon in circuit design that can withstand higher tolerances of heat, a couple of which are gallium-arsenide and silicon-carbide.

Excellent post Xmadness, greenies for you.

Neb

There is only one constant, one universal, it is the only real truth: causality. Action. Reaction. Cause and effect...There is no escape from it, we are forever slaves to it. Our only hope, our only peace is to understand it, to understand the 'why'. 'Why' is what separates us from them, you from me. 'Why' is the only real social power, without it you are powerless.

and over the years, i've become more into the one that runs cooler. I just got my new athlon xp 1700+. It runs cool as a bottle of pepsi in the refrigerator. (exagerated) more like it runs a lil cooler than room tempature (with no heat sink). But.. with my heat sink and fan, it runs about 73, 74 degrees F. Which is great!, if your wondering how i know this. I know it from my computer, it came with an option inside the cmos and you access it as your boot up. Its rather nice. anyway, i will choose amd over intel anyday. =)

oh and another fact of the matter is that amd is also quite faster. and with my computer, athlon xp 1700+ and ddr memory creates a super computer. =)

yes i know about athlon xp, amd, duron and other are similar but different. Thats how i've been taught. =) ..good day.

oh yeah, great paper man.

my pages: (great resources for everyone)geeksarecool.com resource for computers, hacking, virii, wutnot.thepillbox.net archive of logs and resource for laughter.
--enjoy these pages, as they grow.

I have a short and simple statement, Is the minute differance in speed with the monumental differance in costs.

I have found that Athlons appear to run sluggishly against similarly marked P4's in NON Intensive activities, however put them to the test the differance seems nominal.

Now place two Similarly PRICED chips against each otehr, the P4 will still look faster in general untill put under load then the athlon will out perform BUT this is my opinion based on my experience, Myself I'd rather a Pentium 4 with 800FSB than an Athlon XP with 400FSB and when you sit them side by side, it amost makes me cry that my pockets were not quite deep enough

ghostofanonion, this thread is over a year old. If you look at the date on it you will see it was last replied to in July of 2002. The date is also flashing, which means that the thread is considered old and dead.

It is generally rude to bump posts this old by reposting to them, as the issues discussed are simply too far out of dat.

Please try to remember this in the future.

Government is like fire - a handy servant, but a dangerous master - George Washington
Government is not reason, it is not eloquence - it is force. - George Washington.

I understand this thread is very old and yet this discussion right now becomes more muddy than ever with the advent of the 64 bit processors and intel's highly arrogant market move of the p4 extremes. Just becuase a topic has been discussed before dosn't mean the relevance of the situation cannot change. If people don't wish to discuss the topic anymore they will not. in this case though I'm looking for any information i can on this issue it interests me a great deal. love to watch the marketting moves from the big boys it's almost like espionage and warfare it amuses me to no end. Don't wanna talk about it don't. I won't reply to my own posting

If you feel the discussion is "more muddy than ever", the proper thing to do would not be to post in a year old thread. Rather, start a new one if you feel it necessary to.

\"Look, Doc, I spent last Tuesday watching fibers on my carpet. And the whole time I was watching my carpet, I was worrying that I, I might vomit. And the whole time, I was thinking, \"I\'m a grown man. I should know what goes on my head.\" And the more I thought about it... the more I realized that I should just blow my brains out and end it all. But then I thought, well, if I thought more about blowing my brains out... I start worrying about what that was going to do to my goddamn carpet. Okay, so, ah-he, that was a GOOD day, Doc. And, and I just want you to give me some pills and let me get on with my life. \" -Roy Waller